Global Disaster Watch – An Overview

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Wildlife

An Inuvialuit hunter high in the Canadian Arctic came across the first beaver anyone in the region has ever killed — another sign climate change is driving the species northward.

“We saw something walk toward us and it was a beaver. So I drove up to it and I shot it,” said Richard Gruben, vice president of the Tuktoyaktuk Hunters and Trappers Association.

The invading beavers pose a significant threat to the Arctic ecosystem because of the way they reshape the landscape with dams. Gruben says some lakes have already dried up because of beaver dams.

Serengeti Invasion

Non-native plants that have been brought in by visitors or planted for decoration around tourist lodges threaten to spread across East Africa’s Serengeti-Mara landscape, where they could disrupt the annual migration of 2 million grazing animals.

A survey by an international team of researchers reveals that the invasive plants are now on the edges of the vast savannas, home to Africa’s famed wildebeest, zebra and gazelle populations.

The researchers say that if the plants were to spread and displace native vegetation, it would mean less forage for the wildlife.